Adjective Adjustment is a competitive card game for enriching a child’s vocabulary.

This game is for 2 players. Each player is dealt 8 cards. The remaining cards are placed down on the table, with the top card turned face up next to the pile. The object is to be the first player with 2 full families. A full family consists of 4 words within the same category of meaning. (See adjective list below.)

On a Player A’s turn, s/he has 2 choices: (1) Take the card that is face-up by the deck or (2) Ask the other player for a mystery card from his or her hand. After Player A has gotten a new card, s/he then reorganizes his/her potential families of cards in order to choose a card to discard. If s/he got a card from Player B, that player will need to pick the top card from the deck to replace the one given away before taking his/her official turn. Players should always have 8 cards before they take their turns. Play continues in this manner with each player trying to assemble 2 full families of 4 cards each.

The game ends when you are up for a turn and can demonstrate that you have 2 full word families. It’s important not to do this until your turn; if you jump the gun, your opponent will use the strategy of asking you for a mystery card from your hand (thereby depriving you of that chance to win the game.)

WORD LIST: * taken from REWARDS Writing: Word Choice Help Book, Sopris West (2008)

great: terrific, marvelous, wonderful, fantastic, exceptional, magnificent, perfect

happy: glad, pleased, cheerful, overjoyed, jubilant, gleeful, thrilled, delighted

mad: annoyed, resentful, irate, enraged, exasperated, cross, irritated, furious

scared: terrified, frightened, fearful, alarmed, panicked, petrified, nervous, anxious

weird: strange, unusual, odd, peculiar, bizarre, different, irregular, unnatural